'Amateurs' Solve What Experts Can't

Some people say that success needs a visionary mind-set.   Truth is, LIFE needs a visionary mind-set.

We need to see possibility all around us.  Why should we be settling for the status quo when we could be looking for another way because we know that there has to be one?

We were born to stand out.  But, if we want to stand out we have to be Out-Standing!

Outstanding people never settle for safe, near or convenient answers because that is what most people do and the results are always within range of the same. 

Our Commitment to be outstanding means that we push the limits of everything.  Outstanding people see what is possible without caring about the impossible.

A different mindset, without the constraints and so called protocols of what ‘should’ be done based on rules acquired means that all things are possible.  

This is why 'Amateurs' can solve more problems than experts.

Amateurs are not interested in rules, regulations, protocols and limits.  They are only interested in results.  If the limits and protocols preclude you from achieving or solving something, push the limit, alter the rules and realign the protocols.  The result is all that matters.  We need to be the same.  We have to come from a position of having no preconceived ideas or any understanding and acceptance of limitations.

We have to make a stand and be and act in new ways, to risk what we already know for something beyond the predictable. Our Strength and Creativity generates Energy and Excitement that attracts others to take part or even see the possibilities we have uncovered and make their own journey to success.

Stepping out of the constraints of our circumstances, we realise that life begins where our comfort zone ends.  We don’t create an image of what’s possible against who we’ve been or what’s in the past, what’s predictable or expected.  The past has only brought us to this moment, now, here.  It cannot take us further.  Only we can take ourselves forward into the future and towards what we  see as possible. Conditions and circumstances begin to reorder and realign themselves inside of us and what we stand for. Our relationship to possibility moves from an ideal objective to a viable, living reality.

COMMITMENT/ COMMITTMENT - However you spell it....

I was speaking to my friend +Nicole Levac on a Blab yesterday about Committment on your Soul-Full Journey (see it HERE).
The discussion about being committed to your journey reminded me of this story I use in our seminars to demonstrate how, when we commit ourselves to succeeding, we never stop and we do what it takes to get to our destination.

This story is about a man at his wits end.  A man with nowhere to turn.  Like King Midas in reverse,
everything he touches turns to dirt.  He has tried everything to get on his feet and make some money but no one will give him a chance.  He has a wife and two children and providing for them is a constant and never ending struggle.

Like many people in situations like this, he turns to religion.  All his life he has avoided the church services unless absolutely necessary and has always said that prayer is pointless as nobody is listening but here he is, sitting in West Ham Church in East London, looking for an answer.

The Priest walks over to him and sits alongside him.

"What is wrong my son?"

The man opens up.  "Ya know Father, I have always led a good honest life.  I have never been religious but I see so many people getting on in life who never go to church and do all manner of stuff, but me?  I have no money, no job, a family to provide for and nothing to show for my 44 years on this earth"

"You're Michael aren't you?" Asked the priest and the man nodded.  "I remember your father, he was a good friend to this church.  You never attend do you?"

"It's not my thing Father.  I am here because I have nowhere to go.  If I go home my wife is going to ask me if we can pay the rent.  I can't.  I have no money except to feed my wife and children.....I need a job but...'

The priest nodded. "Yes, it is tough out there but...."

The priest rubbed his chin.

"Well, I have a very good friend who has become the Head of a girls school in Stratford.  He is looking for a Janitor.  He needs someone reliable.  Why don't you get yourself over there before he puts an advert in the paper.  I will call him and tell him you are coming."

"Do you think he will employ me Father?" Asked Michael.

"It doesn't hurt to give it a shot does it?"

Michael hurries over to the school and asks for the Head Teacher.  When he finally sits down in the office the Head Teacher laughes.

"Well you have a big job on your hands living up to Father Johns glowing recommendation.  he has been a great friend to me over the years and I know he wouldn't steer me wrong.  He says you are the man we need so, if you want the job, it's yours. Fifteen thousand pounds a year."

Michael could not believe it.  He could see the light at the end of the tunnel, finally.

"All you have to do..." The Head continued, "...is fill out these forms.'

Michael froze.

"I can't do that?" he whispered.

The Head Teacher looked confused.  "Why not?"

"I can't read or write." Michael admitted.

The Head Teacher looked disappointed.  "Michael, " he said, "I need someone who can read because there are chemicals, cleaning materials, and the person I employ needs to be able to read what's what, it's health and safety!"

After another few minutes of pleading, Michael gave up.  He knew that the Head was right.  He slumped in the chair, then stood up and thrust out his hand.

"Thank you for seeing me anyway."

"Wait!" Said the Head as Michael walked to the door. "I feel bad about this but my hands are tied.  Look, please don't leave here empty handed.  My deputy has just returned from Cuba and given me a box of cigars.  I don't smoke, I have no use for them, please, take them.  Good luck!"

Michael took the box, turned and walked out after nodding his thanks at the Head Teacher of the girls school.  If only he could read or write.....

Michael walked and walked.  He walked for miles, wondering what the next move would be.  Eventually he found himself in the City of London near Lloyds in the heart of the financial district.

He watched all the people walking around in their expensive suits and expensive haircuts carrying expensive filofaxes and briefcases, eating expensive sandwiches and driving expensive cars and drinking expensive coffees.  Michael had a box of cigars and 80p in his pocket.

Opposite him, on the other corner, was a cigar shop.  One of those places that sell all manner of cigars and exotic cigarettes from France and Turkey.  Michael walked over and looked in the window at the man behind the counter.  He was watching TV.  The shop was empty when he walked in.

"Can I help you?" asked the man.

"I hope so, I wondered if you would buy these cigars?" Michael asked.

The man put his hands up.

"No can do mate, I had a visit from the VAT people last week.  I have to show receipts for everything.  I can't buy them from you, sorry."

Michael felt the room spin.  He was running out of options.  Then the man spoke again.

"Why don't YOU sell them?"

"Me?" Asked Michael.

"Yeah you!  There are a lot of people around here running around with a lot of cash on the hip.  Big wallets stuffed with cash.  they like to flash it around...pull out a big cigar outside the pub to show off.  Go and put up a sign and sell them.  What are they Churchill, Romeo y Julietas?  You can get £20 for each one."

Michael stared at the cigars.  Then he realized.

"I can't put a sign up, I can't read or write."

The man looked at Michael and thought for a moment.

"You really are in trouble pal aren't you? "

"Do you think people would buy them?" Michael asked.

"It doesn't hurt to give it a shot does it?  Tell you what, I will make the sign for you"

So the man did.  He made a sign on a sheet of cardboard and Michael went further down the road and stood there.  Nothing happened.  Then, at 5pm the offices turned out and all the people he had seen earlier hurried past him to the pubs and wine bars.  Within 10 minutes, Michael had sold the lot.  He now had £400 in cash.  Enough to feed his family and pay the rent.

Next day, Michael walked into the cigar shop and bought some more cigars.  Then he bought more, and more.  He was standing out there every weekday for two years.  Snow, rain, fog, wind, it didn't matter.  He sold cigars.

One day, after two years, he had a brilliant idea.  'Why am i standing in the street in the rain when I could buy that Cigar shop?'

He went and saw his old friend, the cigar shop owner and asked him if he could buy the place.

"You know what?" the old man told him, "If you had asked me two years ago I would have said no but I am getting too old for this and I want to retire abroad.  I will sell it to you, if you can raise the money."

"How much do you want for this shop?"

The shopkeeper didn't pause. "I had this place valued two months ago.  In the middle of the city, prime location, £800,000!"

"Eight hundred grand?" Michael repeated

"I wouldn't rip you off, Michael.  It's a fair price.  Why don't you get a loan from the bank?"

"Do you think they would give me a loan?" Michael asked.

"It doesn't hurt to give it a shot does it?" Said the shopkeeper.

Michael went to the bank and asked to see the manager or whoever is in charge of business loans.  After sitting down in the Managers office Michael told him about his 'business' and the plan to buy the shop in the city.  the Manager nodded and asked Michael how much the shop was.  When Michael told him eight hundred thousand pounds the Manager took his glasses off and sat back in his chair.

"That's a very large amount.  If you want to borrow money you will need to have collateral"

"Collateral?"  Michael asked, "I don't have any collateral!"

"Do you have any money?" Asked the bank manager.

"Yes I have money, I have an account here."  Michael passed his paying in book to the manager who started to enter details onto the screen.  after a few moments, Michael saw the color drain from the Managers face.

"Y-y-y-you have £655,000 in your account!" The manager stammered in shock.

"Do I?" Asked Michael.

"Y-y-y-y-you have £655,000 in your account" the manager repeated. "£655,000.  £655,000 from selling cigars on s-s-s-treet c-c-corners???"

It looked to Michael like the Manager was going to pass out.  He kept repeating it again and again.

"I don't know, I just pay the money in.  I don't know how much is there because I can't read or write."

The manager looked up. "What did you say?"

"I can't read or write!" Michael repeated.

The manager ran his fingers thru his hair and then pinched his nose contemplating what he had just been told.

"Mr Stevens, you have made £655,000 in two years selling cigars on a street corner.  That in itself is one thing but...you can't read or write?  Sir, you are a....a...financial genius.  My God!  Do you have any idea where you would be right now if you could read and write?"

"Yes," Michael told him. "I would be the janitor of a girls school earning £15,000 a year!"

When you are committed you can achieve whatever you desire and nothing will get in your way...

The Source of Transformation

"This is all about becoming the person you were DESTINED to be! You need to release the REAL you! That's right! The REAL you, the one that you were, the one that all this useless 'stuff' is hiding.......We need to strip you back. Back to NOTHING...so that the person you were meant to be recognizes the person you really are, and takes you into a future of endless possibility!"

~ Dave Moore

My Transformation experience is no different from any of the transformation experiences the delegates at the HPT-Transformation seminars experience.  It happens in an instant.

All my life I had been searching for an answer to whatever was in my mind at the time.

Every thought or idea needs an answer, or so I thought.  I had no idea at that point in my life, at that stage of my learning, that answers would come without being searched for, they would come from within.

Answers, be they small or huge, are all around us and we fail to see them sometimes because they are so obvious or, on many occasions, we just have to understand that what we want sometimes comes dressed as something else and we need to unwrap it

I had been adding information to my 'store of information' throughout my life.  Experience built on experience.  In truth, these experiences, learnings, teachings, ideas had all been added in the hope that something magical or unknown would happen allowing me to get to a critical mass of ideas and there would be an explosion...or I would find the real secret.

Rain.

Rain on my face.

Even now, when most people run for cover when rain falls, I turn my face to the sky and let it hit my face.  I know what it means...it means I am alive.

Many people know of the slight accident in late 2014 ago when I ended up upside down in the back of a taxi that was in a head on collision in central London.

After 36 hours of tests in a London hospital I was discharged.
Was I concerned? No.
Did I fear for my life? No.
It was just another adventure...

What do I mean by that?  I see everything as an adventure, something to experience, another incident that I can look back on, something I can draw strength from, something that I can grow from.

Where did THAT mindset come from?

In 2009 I was driving from Lyon to Paris in France.  I had been staying with friends and was on my way to visit some more in Paris before I boarded the Eurostar back to England a few days later.  It was late in the evening and raining quite heavily.  I had been asked to pick up a large strawberry gateaux from a patisserie in Lyon and it was sitting on the passenger seat of the hire car.  A leisurely drive to Paris was almost complete as the rain started to ease off on the country road.  The car headlights lit a sign telling me that there were only 35km left on my journey before I reached the Peripherique, the ring road around Paris.  I drove around the sharp right bend in the road when suddenly I was blinded by the headlights of a car directly in front of me on my side of the road.

I swerved to my left but the other car smashed into the rear wing of my car with a deafening crash and I was airborne over the steep bank that fell sharply from the left side of the road.

No sooner had my car hit the slope of the bank it started to roll down it.  It seemed endless.  It seemed in slow motion.  Memories were stored.  I remember as the car turned over and over the Gateaux hitting me and the windscreen.  I remember after turning over three times thinking to myself 'This is a bit excessive!'  I remember hitting my head on the steering wheel.  I remember the roof of the car compressing down onto me, the windows shattering.  I remember the roar of the engine, and the deafening, constant, sound of the horn.
Finally the car righted itself at the bottom of a 60ft bank...and silence.

I am told that it was twenty minutes before the emergency services arrived.  A crash team, fire service and paramedic team all descended on me as the car sat where it had finally come to rest, on a dirt road leading from who knows where, to a large house about 50ft away.

A very shocked looking man in a police uniform put his hand over his mouth as he looked into the car at me. "Le gars est mort, le cerveau et le sang partout!" he shouted.  Even my basic French told me he had shouted that I was dead and there was blood and brains everywhere...

"I'm not dead!" I shouted, "That's a strawberry gateaux"

I thought the car had caught fire or even worse, they were letting off fireworks (Thanks, how kind!), but it was an angle grinder that was cutting through the car to get me out.

Eventually I was out of the car and strapped to a stretcher on wheels.  I was given a neck brace that covered all of my head apart from my face.  I lay there, thankful that I was alive.

In what seemed like minutes but were more likely as not seconds, I changed.  I changed completely.

I can pinpoint that change to that very moment without any hesitation or uncertainty.  At that moment, lying on that stretcher, next to a dirt road near Paris, I had a realisation.

I had almost died but I no longer feared death, because I had stared it in the face and it had turned away.  I no longer fear death and never will.
I realised I still had so much to do in my life.  People to meet, places to go.  I resolved not to stop until all of my goals and dreams were realised and I knew that would be never, as new ones appear all the time.
I realised that time was precious and life was precious too.  Lives can change in a moment.  Every second of every day was meant to be enjoyed, explored and appreciated.
I realised I had wasted so much time in my life.  I hadn't done what I wanted or should have done on occasion.  I hadn't said what I wanted or should have said on occasion.
I realised that I would say and do exactly what I felt I needed to from now on.
If I liked someone I would tell them immediately.  If I wanted to do something I would do it.  If I delayed it, I may never get another chance.

I had become something other.  Something else from the person I had been until that moment.  I had a greater understanding and appreciation.  I had a far more powerful understanding of myself, and my capability.  I had been released.

As the rain hit my face I understood that it was great to be alive.  It was as if I was a different person from the old me, I was now the New Me!

I lay on that stretcher and realised that, as I felt the rain on my face, I was alive, I was different, I was transformed.

After a month in hospital I was transferred to England and eventually, after a few weeks, went home.

I could philosophize about the accident.  Why it happened.  The reasons, the timing, the significance etc etc. Saying 'Why me?' was for other people to say.  The truth was, that accident was one of the greatest events of my life.  It made me realise so much about myself.  It made me become the person I was meant to be.

I have a very small chipped piece of bone at the base of my spine that causes me pain now and then. I lived with that for a few years.  I have now had it removed.

When it rains I turn my face to the sky for a while to feel the raindrops on my face, and I relive that moment when I became the new me...
It was Transformational.

What happened on the day of my Transformation, after I had crashed my car and was lying on a stretcher in a French field with the rain landing on my face was like nothing else that had happened in my life.

It wasn't anything like 'new' information being given to me.  It wasn't that I had suddenly realised things.  

It was that the system in which my information was contained was touched, so I suddenly went from knowing these five billion things to knowing a totally different five billion things.

I firmly believe that in moments like this, and even in realisation moments less extreme than this, we have to be near to 'The Source' to gain the understanding.

In other words, in one moment I knew nothing about what I knew and came to know everything.  I am not being unhumble in this so take this in the spirit it is meant.  I REALLY knew what I already knew, I understood it, and I experienced it.  Experiencing is the key, it's the reality.

I went through this period where I absolutely didn't know anything, because I could see that every piece of information which I contained, even the information contained in my brain about how to function, were contained within a system or context that precluded aliveness.

My entire system of knowing - not what I knew, but the system or context in which I knew - fell away and I came out the other side and found everything in an instant.

I am so excited when the trainees at the seminars get the Transformation.  They all break free from their identification with their minds and bodies and glimpse who they REALLY are, which is actually who they have been all along.  They de-identify with their mind, they de-identify with their body, they de-identify with their emotions, they de-identify with their problems, they de-identify with their 'Maya', and they begin to see they are not this play, this performance, this fiction.  With this de-identification they relinquish this drama of their lives and see the person they were always destined to be.

Self is all there is, that's it.  We provide the crack in the wall through which the trainees see themselves and the world.  Sometimes, just a few bricks are all that's needed to be demolished, sometimes the whole wall. It is true enlightenment.  

This is the fundamental change that takes place in the mind in an instant but takes four days of awareness training, harmonic development and experiential expansion techniques to achieve.  The trainees are turned around 180 degrees, from who they are...to who they were destined to be.  The Real person!

This enlightenment is internal and is therefore called 'In Lightenment' within the HPT lexicon.

As a Zen master once put it, after this process everything is exactly as it was before, except two feet off the ground.